For Haas, leadership comes with a catch

Surging Woods grabs share of first in Tour Championship

Published 6:30 am, Sunday, November 7, 2004

ATLANTA - He is building up a head of steam again, just as he did in the days when he was golf's irresistible force.

Tiger Woods is at the top of the Tour Championship leader board, just 18 holes away from victory. If precedent counts for anything, the outcome is as predictable as an encounter between a cockroach and the bottom of a shoe.

The only thing standing between Woods and his first victory in more than eight months is golf's movable object. Jay Haas is 50. He's tied for the lead. He hasn't won a tournament in 11 years.

Haas is less than a month away from yet another birthday. If he squints, he can make out the handwriting on the wall: The golf world expects him to start acting his age during the final round of the final event of the season.

"I would," Haas said.

He would if he weren't the one who rallied from two bogeys in the first three holes at East Lake Golf Club to fashion a 2-under-par 68 on Saturday.

Haas, the oldest player ever to qualify for the Tour Championship, is 9 under and has led or shared the lead in all three rounds. Mike Weir (67), Stephen Ames (70) and U.S. Open champion Retief Goosen (69) are 5 under — the only players closer than seven shots from the leaders.

So it is that Haas will play in the last twosome today alongside Woods, who recovered from a three-putt bogey on the first hole to shoot 65. Haas has nine career victories on the PGA Tour. Woods, 28, has won eight major championships. Haas is making his 277th start since his last victory. Woods has won 40 times on tour since Haas captured the H.E.B. Texas Open in the third-to-last event of the 1993 season.

"This isn't my first rodeo," said Haas, who enters the final round with the lead for the fourth time since his last win. "What I tell myself and what I tell my sons, anybody, any friend that is in the last group or in the hunt: 'That's what I strive to do. This is what I've worked all my life to do, to be in this position, to not be able to swallow on 17 and to not be able to spit.' I need to embrace that feeling rather than worry about it or think, 'I can't do this.' "

Woods has the sort of track record that doesn't lend itself to self-doubt. He has converted 30 of 32 third-round leads into victories — including the past 11. The last player to reel in Woods in the final round was Phil Mickelson in 2000. At the Tour Championship. At East Lake.

Of course, Woods has been trying to buff off the rough edges on a swing he decided to remake this year. Woods failed to reach the five-victory plateau for the first time since 1998, when he was overhauling his swing. He has one victory and is fourth on the money list — exactly where he stood at the end of 1998. A victory today would put Woods at nearly $6 million in earnings for a season he deems to be considerably more frustrating than 1998.

"I've never been asked more questions about my game, because I was still new back in '97 and '98," Woods said. "I've been questioned on it each and every round I've ever played this year. 'What's wrong with you?' Shoot 66 — 'What's wrong with you?' "

Imagine what inquiring minds will want to know if golf's irresistible force cannot budge a movable object that hasn't stood its ground in more than a decade.

"I've got to look at it like I deserve to be there," Haas said. "There's no defense out here. If I play well, he can't stop me. If he plays well, I can't stop him."